The poor man’s Patriot missile

India’s Akash surface-to-air missile system

Vivek Raghuvanshi reports that the Indian government has cleared the Akash surface-to-air missile system for export to friendly countries — ‘a battery of Akash missiles will consist of three tracked vehicles mounted with four missiles each and a vehicle carrying (the Rajendra) phased-array radar capable of tracking up to four targets at a time’.

Each missile is capable of carrying a 50kg payload over 25km, and only costs about US$260,000. India’s Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) is pitching the system as a budget Patriot-1 type air defence system. Both the Indian army and air-force have already placed orders.